The independent counsel investigation

Impeaching is to bring federal charges against someone in office.
The charges arose from an investigation by Independent CounselKenneth Starr.
Originally dealing with the failed land deal years earlier known as Whitewater, Starr, with the approval of Attorney GeneralJanet Reno, conducted a wide ranging investigation of alleged abuses including the firing of white house travel agents, the misuse of FBI files, and Clinton's conduct during the sexual harassment lawsuit filed by a former Arkansasgovernment employee, Paula Jones. In the course of the investigation, Linda Tripp provided Starr with taped phone conversations in which Monica Lewinsky, a former White House Intern, discussed having oral sex with Clinton. Based on this and other evidence Starr concluded that Clinton perjured himself when, in a sworn deposition for this case, Clinton denied having a "sexual affair" or "sexual relations" with White HouseinternMonica Lewinsky. At the deposition, the judge ordered a precise legal definition of the term "sexual relations" that Clinton claims to have construed to mean only vaginalintercourse. A much-quoted statement from Clinton's grand jurytestimony showed him questioning the precise use of the word "is." Clinton said, "It depends on what the meaning of the word 'is' is. If the—if he—if 'is' means is and never has been, that is not—that is one thing. If it means there is none, that was a completely true statement". Starr obtained further evidence of Clinton's philandering by seizing the computer hard drive and email records of Monica Lewinsky. Based on his conflicting testimony, Starr concluded that Clinton had committed perjury. Starr, in turn, was criticized for spending 70 million dollars in an investigation that substantiated no wrongdoing other than perjury and obstruction of justice. Critics of Starr also contend that his investigation was highly politicized because it regularly leaked tidbits of information to the press and because his report included lengthy pornographic descriptions which were humiliating yet irrelevant to the legal case.

The January 1998 press conference

After rumors of the scandal reached the news, Clinton publicly stated, "I did not have sexual relations with that woman, Miss Lewinsky." In his Paula Jones deposition, he swore, "I have never had sexual relations with Monica Lewinsky. I've never had an affair with her." Months later, Clinton admitted that his relationship with Lewinsky was "wrong" and "not appropriate." In fact, Clinton engaged in oral sex with Ms. Lewinsky on several occasions.

Impeachment by the House of Representatives

The House Judiciary Committee conducted no investigations of its own into Clinton's alleged wrongdoing, and it held no serious impeachment-related hearings before the 1998 mid-term elections. Nevertheless, impeachment was one of the major issues in the election. In November 1998, the Democrats picked up seats in the Congress. (The previous mid-term election, in 1994, had been a major debacle for Clinton's Democratic Party.)

Impeachment proceedings were initiated during the post-election, "lame duck" session of the outgoing 105th Congress. The committee hearings were perfunctory, but the floor debate in the whole House was spirited on both sides. The Speaker-designateRepresentative Bob Livingston, chosen by the Republican Party Conference to replace outgoing Speaker Newt Gingrich, announced the end of his candidacy for Speaker and his resignation from Congress from the floor of the house after Livingston's own marital infidelity came to light. Livingston, in that same speech, encouraged Clinton to resign as well. Clinton chose to remain in office and encouraged Livingston to reconsider resigning.
Contemporaneously, some media reported on house manager Henry Hyde's marital infidelity of several decades prior.

No live witnesses were called during the trial, although four witnesses were interviewed on videotape: President Clinton, Monica Lewinsky, Clinton's friend Vernon Jordan, and White House aide Sidney Blumenthal.

"Simply put, the president's deposition testimony regarding whether he had ever been alone with Ms. (Monica) Lewinsky was intentionally false, and his statements regarding whether he had ever engaged in sexual relations with Ms. Lewinsky likewise were intentionally false ... ."

In January 2001, on the day before leaving office, Clinton agreed to a five-year suspension of his Arkansaslaw license as part of an agreement with the independent counsel to end the investigation. Based on this suspension, Clinton was automatically suspended from the United States Supreme Court bar, from which he then chose to resign.

Civil Settlement with Paula Jones

Eventually, the court dismissed the Paula Jones harassment lawsuit, before trial, on the grounds that Jones failed to demonstrate any damages. However, while the dismissal was on appeal, Clinton entered into an out-of-court settlement by agreeing to pay Jones $850,000.

Political ramifications

Polls conducted during 1998 and early 1999 showed that only about one-third of Americans supported Clinton's impeachment or conviction. However, one year later half of Americans said that they supported impeachment and 42% disapproved of the Senate's decision to keep him in office.

While Clinton's job approval rating rose during the Lewinsky scandal and subsequent impeachment, his poll numbers with regard to questions of honesty, integrity and moral character declined. As a result, "moral character" and "honesty" weighed heavily in the next presidential election. According to The Daily Princetonian, after the 2000 presidential election, "post-election polls found that, in the wake of Clinton-era scandals, the single most significant reason people voted for Bush was for his moral character.
According to an analysis of the election by Stanford University:

"A more political explanation is the belief in Gore campaign circles that disapproval of President Clinton’s personal behavior was a serious threat to the vice president’s prospects. Going into the election the one negative element in the public’s perception of the state of the nation was the belief that the country was morally on the wrong track, whatever the state of the economy or world affairs. According to some insiders, anything done to raise the association between Gore and Clinton would have produced a net loss of support—the impact of Clinton’s personal negatives would outweigh the positive impact of his job performance on support for Gore. Thus, hypothesis 4 suggests that a previously unexamined variable played a major role in 2000—the retiring president’s personal approval.

"In the wake of the Clinton scandals, independents warmed to Bush's promise to 'restore honor and dignity to the White House.' According to Voter News Service, the personal quality that mattered most to voters was 'honesty.' Voters who chose 'honesty' preferred Bush over Gore by over a margin of 5 to 1. Forty Four percent of Americans said the Clinton scandals were important to their vote. Of these, Bush reeled in three out of every four.

Al Gore reportedly confronted Clinton after the election, and "tried to explain that keeping Clinton under wraps [during the campaign] was a rational response to polls showing swing voters were still mad as hell over the Year of Monica.